Many drivers, at one time or another, have experienced difficulty in locating a vehicle that they have previously parked. Malls, airports, and other large venues often feature parking garages or tiered parking structures that make losing a vehicle particularly easy and finding a misplaced vehicle particularly challenging. Portable electronic devices have been developed that may help a driver locate a parked vehicle. However, many of these devices include an integrated global positioning system (GPS) position finding capability, which must identify the GPS location of the vehicle before the relative position of the device may be determined. As a result of this GPS-dependency, such devices may fail to operate properly in areas where satellite reception is poor or lacking. Unfortunately, such areas may include parking garages, tiered parking structures, downtown areas surrounded by high-rise buildings, and other areas where vehicles are often parked. If the fob itself also employs a GPS positioning finding capability, this capability may also be inoperative when the fob is carried into a shopping mall, office building or other structure that is substantially opaque to the GPS signals. Other systems rely on local beacons or nodes placed in known locations in and around the parking areas or structures. By tracking its location relative to these nodes the device location can be determined. However, such beacon systems may fail to function if the device is carried into an office building or other structure where the beacon signals are no longer received.
Accordingly, there exists an ongoing need to provide a multi-mode parked vehicle location system that may guide a user back to his or her vehicle with or without the aid of satellite signals or local beacon signals and continue to operate even when such signals are not available. It is desirable that such a device be integrated into an existing electronic device of the type typically carried by a driver, such as a keyfob, cell phone, personal digital assistant (PDA), micro-computer, and so forth. Other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the foregoing technical field and background.